Northwest Schools.

Pop Bottles Have Style As Clothing

Show To Give Students A New Look At Recycling

November 15, 2000|By John Maes. Special to the Tribune.

BUFFALO GROVE — Looking at an array of brightly colored hooded parkas, fleecy sweaters, mittens and hats sporting the names of popular clothing manufacturers, it's hard to realize the clothes were once pop bottles.

A sense of wonderment about what's being done with recyclable materials these days is just what Mary Allen hopes will captivate students at Buffalo Grove High School on Wednesday.

Allen, recycling and education director for the Solid Waste Agency of Northern Cook County, will serve as master of ceremonies for a fashion show of apparel items and accessories made of recycled materials.

About 1,000 students from science and consumer education classes are expected to attend the three showings at the school, 1100 W. Dundee Rd.

About 25 students, mostly from fashion design classes, will promenade through the school auditorium in some of the latest designs and accessories made from recyclables, particularly those from polyethylene terephthalate, or PET plastic, from which soft drink bottles are made. Student models will also carry accessories such as hats, scarves, gloves, mittens, handbags and garment bags, most of which were bottles or plastic containers in previous lives.

The show is intended to show students that not only is recycling solid waste a good idea from an environmental standpoint but that it can also lead to nice-looking clothes. The event ties in with Wednesday's national observance of America Recycles Day to raise awareness of the benefits of recycling and buying items made from recycled materials, according to Allen.

The sponsoring SWANCC is an association of 23 northwest suburban Cook County municipalities formed in 1988 to devise solutions to the area's waste disposal problems.

The reaction at previous shows over the last four years at Maine East, Maine South, Wheeling, Conant and St. Viator High Schools, along with Harper College, is usually one of amazement, Allen said.

"Initially, when their teachers tell them they're going to be wearing recycled plastics, they envision pop bottles that are glued on to something, but the whole concept of processing these materials into clothing is just miraculous and the end result is these products are durable and good-looking," Allen said.

Participating students are enthusiastic about the opportunity to show classmates the benefits of saving, rather than tossing, reusable materials.

"A lot of kids need to know more about how important it is to recycle," said freshman Jeewan Ghuman, 14, an Ecology Club member who will serve as a backstage helper during the show. "I think this will give them an awareness that it's a good idea."

For students who express curiosity about exactly how a 7-Up bottle becomes a dress, Allen said she will have visual materials on hand to show how the process works: Bottles are crushed into tiny pieces and melted into pellets. From there, the pellets are put into an extruder, a machine that stretches the pellets at high heat. The result is strands of fibers that can be woven into yarn in much the same way as wool and cotton, Allen said.

Overall recycling efforts in Illinois appear to be paying off, Allen said. The amount of waste recycled in the state increased to 28 percent of the total in 1998 from 26 percent in 1997, according to the latest report on landfill capacity from the Illinois Environmental Protection Agency.